Lady Liberty may be the subject of Vo’s exhibition, but if you stumble upon the work (which is placed in Brooklyn Bridge Park and City Hall Park), you might not even realize it at first. Vo created a 1:1 replica of the Statue of Liberty, then chopped it into 250 pieces, some of which are scattered throughout those two parks. Markers give you a sense of what you’re seeing: at one site, you might glimpse a bit of her ear, while at the other, you might find a piece of her dress—but part of the fun is figuring it all out.

Art installations have been integral to the High Line’s design since it opened to the public in 2009, and mounted its first group exhibition in 2012. Its third assemblage of artists is “Archeo,” a meditation on technology. The pieces on view incorporate items like washing-machine parts, smoothies made from sneakers (yes, really), and odd, moving parts; the sculpture pictured, by Antoine Catala, actually moves as if it were breathing.

Looming high over Rockefeller Center, this 37-foot-tall sculpture is like an exaggerated version of the floral topiaries you might have seen in a garden somewhere. Koons is also the subject of a major retrospective on view at the Whitney Museum of American Art right now, but passing by this sculpture—which is covered in 50,000 flowers—is a way to see the controversial artist’s large-scale work in a totally different setting.

Timothy Schenck

Mark Handforth, “Sidewalk Island”

Governors Island really does have it all: Incredible Manhattan views, a section devoted to hammocks, and rolling fields that are the perfect setting for public-art installations. Four of Handforth’s sculptures are dotted throughout the island, including Yankee Hanger, an enormous replica of a wire hanger that’s been twisted at the neck. (Cue visitors quoting _Mommie Dearest _as they pass by.)

Each year, MoMA PS1 selects a winner in its Young Architects Program, who then goes on to install a huge, often interactive artwork in the museum’s courtyard. And for 2014, the winner is the Living (the alias of an artist named David Benjamin), who created a large-scale, 100 percent organic installation. “Bricks” (actually made from organic materials like corn stalks) are stacked into circular towers that, weirdly, resemble nuclear reactors. Plan a day around visiting the exhibition on the weekends, and you’ll be able to catch a DJ set during the museum’s insanely popular Warm Up series.

Randall’s Island, a small green space in the middle of the East River, is home to the annual Flow art festival. This year, four artists have installed work along the southern end of the island. We especially like City Pillars by Dean Monogenis, who created seven striped, rectangular poles, whose shape and placement echoes that of the skyscrapers across the river.

Anyone who’s ever driven through Manhattan will giggle at Ruscha’s new work, which is his first public-art commission in NYC. The work is a reproduction of a drawing Ruscha did in 1977, but its placement—along the High Line, the railway-turned-public-park that now soars above often traffic-clogged Tenth Avenue—is particularly amusing. (It’s hand-painted, a nod to Ruscha’s past as a sign-painter—though the work was created by a pro company, not the artist himself.)

Before it became an outdoor sculpture museum, this Long Island City park was an illegal dumping site. But you wouldn't know it by visiting the park now: Installations are carefully placed throughout, and different events (such as outdoor yoga and tai chi classes) happen on a regular basis. There are four exhibitions on view this summer, including Austin+Mergold's _Folly: SuralArk, _a ship-like structure that visitors can wander in and around.

New York artist Rachel Feinstein took inspiration from so-called architectural follies—pieces that have little practical purpose, but look cool—for this work, situated in Madison Square Park. She created several quirky pieces, including what appears to be a pirate's ship stuck in a tree.